We made it! Our southernmost destination – Georgetown and Stocking Island – where at least 200 boaters are anchored out enjoying the warm sun and cool breeze.

Just another day in Paradise.

But it didn’t start out that way. Of course, if you’ve followed our travels you know that for us there might be the inevitable bump or two in the road.

We came down from Emerald Bay Marina on some fairly rough seas and entered the cut toward Stocking Island.

We pulled into an area near a beach that looked fairly protected with space for us. There were several other boats nearby and they were all watching us come in. Ed went up front to get the anchor ready while I slowly steered forward.

As he dropped the anchor the guy on the Scottish boat beside us starts yelling and waving his arms. We couldn’t hear what he was saying because of the wind.

“You’re too close, you got the whole Bahamas to anchor and you get beside me! I don’t want to look in your cockpit and I don’t want you looking in mine!” He yelled a few other unintelligible and probably unrepeatable Scottish words our way.

Ed and I looked at each other and around the neighborhood of boats. We weren’t any closer to this raving lunatic than anyone else was to other boats. So we stayed put.

Surly Scot pulled up his anchor and moved out. Good riddance we thought. He yelled at us again as he was leaving and Ed replied.

“We heard you, thank you sir, have a great day.” Nice touch.

And those are Ed’s people, those Scots, I reminded him.

As it turned out we moved our boat down closer to Chat ‘n Chill so our dinghy ride there is 3 minutes away. More on that to come.

Anyways we found a great little private beach and protected cove in 5 feet of water. But we sweated low tide yesterday when it got down to under 4 feet. Ed went down several times to check whether we were bumping. He even started pushing sand around with his feet to level it out. What a guy!

Probably thanks to Ed’s toe-dredging efforts, she stayed afloat! Within inches.

We made the trip to Georgetown, a 10 minute dinghy ride, to get groceries and get me to the clinic. I’ve been living with an ear infection for 2 weeks. I went to the clinic and $40 later got a prescription for drugs, one of which the pharmacy didn’t have.

They told me to go to Smittys up the road for the pills I needed. Ed found me a ride with a couple of local people at our lunch place. We had to wait for them to finish eating. I climbed into their truck which had a huge pile of assorted trash and junk in the front floorboard. The lady driver said we’re a waste truck.

Duh I thought, that’s quite obvious.

We had a nice chat and she let me off at Smitty’s. Unfortunately she was going on so I was left to find a ride for the 5 miles back.

As I shut the truck door I saw it was a waste management truck. Oh now I get it.

And Smitty’s was not just a pharmacy, they had hardware, groceries and nail polish I needed to hide my terrible toes (my kingdom for a pedicure at Groove Jet Salon).

As the American pharmacist filled my prescription, he let me know it would cost $60. I told him that was fine, I had just done a doctor visit and another drug for just $40, which back home would have been $150.

He agreed and said these $60 pills in the States might be $300.

Hmmm, their healthcare here must be considered a right for everyone, not just for those who can afford it?

What a concept!